[KSIXephos938]

Consider the Fischer FA-003. Really though the Shure 840 is a great headphone for the price and great for home usage. Both should do the job well. The E07k can amp both no worries.

You can get the Fischer FA-003 cheaper by buying the Brainwavs HM5, which is the exact same headphone but a cheaper rebranding.

Thanks, I'll have a look at both headphones, but will they sound good even without an amp? This was one of my concerns and so was why I choose the M50's. My E07K is currently attached to my gaming laptop and is connected to my Razer Tiamat 2.2 and Creative speakers for added bass. It would be a pain to connect and reconnect every time I wanted to listen to music. Would the FiiO E6 be able to amp sufficiently? Thanks.

 

[Leliana]

Not sure about the E6, never heard it or do I know how powerful it is.
 
The 840 doesn't need amping, the E6 should be sufficient.
 
Something I just thought to mention, if you listen to mostly mainstream pop/rock. Well many songs tend to have poorer recordings and a lot are brightly mastered. The 840 being more neutral and detailed might show up a lot of the flaws despite being preferred by yourself for being more "analytical" than the M50.

 

[KSIXephos938]

Not sure about the E6, never heard it or do I know how powerful it is.

The 840 doesn't need amping, the E6 should be sufficient.

Something I just thought to mention, if you listen to mostly mainstream pop/rock. Well many songs tend to have poorer recordings and a lot are brightly mastered. The 840 being more neutral and detailed might show up a lot of the flaws despite being preferred by yourself for being more "analytical" than the M50.

The FiiO E6 is fairly low powered. It costs $30 but its known to be compared to more expensive $100 amps. And about the Shure's what about songs purchased from iTunes and what about songs from CD's, aren't they even better than flac files? Thanks.

 

[Leliana]

The FiiO E6 is fairly low powered. It costs $30 but its known to be compared to more expensive $100 amps. And about the Shure's what about songs purchased from iTunes and what about songs from CD's, aren't they even better than flac files? Thanks.

 
There is no reason why they will sound poor on a headphone really, but I'm not talking about the audio bitrate or format. I mean that even on CD some albums are mastered very poorly and can be fatiguing. Take say Katy Perry's last album, whatever it was called, the song I heard on my headphone/s was very bright, and it was really lousy sounding.
 
Might be best to just go with the ATH M50 for pop music, as I've heard it does very well for it. The Shure 840 is not the best pop headphone, reveals that brightness in spades. The 840 would be more detailed for rock though.
 
My bad for not seeing that part of your earlier post/s.

 

[KSIXephos938]

There is no reason why they will sound poor on a headphone really, but I'm not talking about the audio bitrate or format. I mean that even on CD some albums are mastered very poorly and can be fatiguing. Take say Katy Perry's last album, whatever it was called, the song I heard on my headphone/s was very bright, and it was really lousy sounding.

Might be best to just go with the ATH M50 for pop music, as I've heard it does very well for it. The Shure 840 is not the best pop headphone, reveals that brightness in spades. The 840 would be more detailed for rock though.

My bad for not seeing that part of your earlier post/s.

Would the SRH840's really show bad mastering and artifacts that badly? I mean they are only $50 more than the M50's and the Momentums are more expensive than them. The M50's might be better for me. I'm not a huge audiophile as I don't overly enjoy classical, jazz and rock music but I don't mind Michael Jackson and a bit of doo-wop. But are the M50's flat sounding? You said that it wasn't fully flat. It does say 'Studio Monitoring' on the headphones. Thanks.

 

[Leliana]

Would the SRH840's really show bad mastering and artifacts that badly? I mean they are only $50 more than the M50's and the Momentums are more expensive than them. The M50's might be better for me. I'm not a huge audiophile as I don't overly enjoy classical, jazz and rock music but I don't mind Michael Jackson and a bit of doo-wop. But are the M50's flat sounding? You said that it wasn't fully flat. It does say 'Studio Monitoring' on the headphones. Thanks.

The 840 is flatter.
 
The 840 I have heard described by a fair few people as fatiguing with poor recordings.
 
The ATH m50 is bit bassy, with a raised bass response below 200hz. The upper mids/lower treble are a bit recessed? with a treble spike I think.
 
The 840 has a mid bass hump as well, but the mids are flatter across the board, but the treble has a larger spike. The Shure 840 are brighter and thus more unforgiving of the poor recordings.
 
Hmmm. I mentioned earlier the Audio Technica A900x, I didn't futher mention them due to your price preferences. They are $300 AUD, and they would be a lot better than both of these headphones for your music taste. Don't worry, they are not super bassy or bright but rather mid centric. I enjoyed my kpop a hell of lot, using them at the store. That was straight from a walkman. They can be amped off your E6 no trouble, I used to amp my audio technicas right off my ipod classic at home myself.
 
Where are you located anyway? If you are melbourne or perth there are stores you can walk into and test out headphones to your hearts content.
 
Might be best for me to step out of this thread. I'm trying to help but I bet I'm coming off as confusing for someone starting in headfi

Its just that I've been out of the lower end market for a while and never listen to much mainstream other than asian pop. Pretty hard thinking up headphones I've heard that need no amping.

 

[BillsonChang007]

Would the SRH840's really show bad mastering and artifacts that badly? I mean they are only $50 more than the M50's and the Momentums are more expensive than them. The M50's might be better for me. I'm not a huge audiophile as I don't overly enjoy classical, jazz and rock music but I don't mind Michael Jackson and a bit of doo-wop. But are the M50's flat sounding? You said that it wasn't fully flat. It does say 'Studio Monitoring' on the headphones. Thanks.

There are indeed some studio using the ATH-M50 but personally, I find them have a recessed mids at around 1KHz making it not perfect for studio but I know who uses it for mixing! And that's pretty good!

As for amping, if you are using iPhone/iPod/iPad, you do not need any amp for SRH-840. They are easy to drive. To my ears, they are indeed a little bit unforgiving to some records but hey! It's not all that bad and not very noticeable. iTunes and CDs have some good quality sound to it but some albums have some very bad mastering in that case, even the highest of the highest audio format would not help making it sound anyway better xD

Billson

 

[KSIXephos938]

The 840 is flatter.

The 840 I have heard described by a fair few people as fatiguing with poor recordings.

The ATH m50 is bit bassy, with a raised bass response below 200hz. The upper mids/lower treble are a bit recessed? with a treble spike I think.

The 840 has a mid bass hump as well, but the mids are flatter across the board, but the treble has a larger spike. The Shure 840 are brighter and thus more unforgiving of the poor recordings.

Hmmm. I mentioned earlier the Audio Technica A900x, I didn't futher mention them due to your price preferences. They are $300 AUD, and they would be a lot better than both of these headphones for your music taste. Don't worry, they are not super bassy or bright but rather mid centric. I enjoyed my kpop a hell of lot, using them at the store. That was straight from a walkman. They can be amped off your E6 no trouble, I used to amp my audio technicas right off my ipod classic at home myself.

Where are you located anyway? If you are melbourne or perth there are stores you can walk into and test out headphones to your hearts content.

Might be best for me to step out of this thread. I'm trying to help but I bet I'm coming off as confusing for someone starting in headfi
Its just that I've been out of the lower end market for a while and never listen to much mainstream other than asian pop. Pretty hard thinking up headphones I've heard that need no amping.

I might go for the M50's as it is the cheaper option. Also about the A-900X, they are quite expensive and if I would pay that much for a pair of headphones, I would use them everywhere, not just at home.

I live in Melbourne. The only dedicated shop I have found for audio equipment is a store I found in Westfield. You're able to try all the headphones they sell but they overprice their items. I found a pair of Sennheiser Amperiors that was $459.99. I tried for 1 minute on the M50's and to me they sounded a bit mediocre but that might be because I had my IE80's on me and I EQ'ed them. I also tried the Amperiors and the SRH-440's. the Amperiors sounded amazing. If I liked them would you say i Would like the Momentums? The 440 sounded quite good as well. Was a bit disappointed with the lack of bass but the mids were good. Might mean that the M50's would suit me better.

 

[Leliana]

There are a couple of good places to audition in Melbourne with a fantastic variety.

There is addicted to audio which is in Kew.
Also noisy motel in prahan
And jaben on lonsdale street in the city.

These are 3 headphone stores, actual headphone specialists. You can go in any try stuff there. Look em up on Google.

 

[BillsonChang007]

I might go for the M50's as it is the cheaper option. Also about the A-900X, they are quite expensive and if I would pay that much for a pair of headphones, I would use them everywhere, not just at home.

I live in Melbourne. The only dedicated shop I have found for audio equipment is a store I found in Westfield. You're able to try all the headphones they sell but they overprice their items. I found a pair of Sennheiser Amperiors that was $459.99. I tried for 1 minute on the M50's and to me they sounded a bit mediocre but that might be because I had my IE80's on me and I EQ'ed them. I also tried the Amperiors and the SRH-440's. the Amperiors sounded amazing. If I liked them would you say i Would like the Momentums? The 440 sounded quite good as well. Was a bit disappointed with the lack of bass but the mids were good. Might mean that the M50's would suit me better.

You might like the Momentum better but it's less aggressive! If you wanted more bass with the mids and highs of SRH-440, again, I would go for the SRH-840! The ATH-M50's mids are very different and you may not like it if you like the Amperior and SRH-440 mids!

 

[KSIXephos938]

You might like the Momentum better but it's less aggressive! If you wanted more bass with the mids and highs of SRH-440, again, I would go for the SRH-840! The ATH-M50's mids are very different and you may not like it if you like the Amperior and SRH-440 mids!

Thanks, Im on term break right now s il check out some of the stores mentioned above. I'll audition them myself and see how they go. Thanks.

 

[KSIXephos938]

Hi, so I've decided to buy the M50's as it was the cheaper option but after a few days of listening to them, I can hear a screeching sound. It sorta sounds muffled and harsh. Do you believe that burning in your headphones will help solve this? Also, my IE80's have been EQ'ed and I have gotten used to the sound. I am currently using a Cowon J3. Do you have any EQ settings that can remove the harsh sound? Thanks.

 

[BillsonChang007]

Hi, so I've decided to buy the M50's as it was the cheaper option but after a few days of listening to them, I can hear a screeching sound. It sorta sounds muffled and harsh. Do you believe that burning in your headphones will help solve this? Also, my IE80's have been EQ'ed and I have gotten used to the sound. I am currently using a Cowon J3. Do you have any EQ settings that can remove the harsh sound? Thanks.

Hmm... I don't have that harsh issue but hopefully time is everything to it. As for now, you can try tuning down the FR at around 6-10KHz. Vocals may be thrown back and details may be slightly lacking more as well buy it may or may not fix the harshness. If that didn't work, the last thing you can do out of EQ-ing will be tuning down the 16KHz. Details will definitely reduced but will hopefully fix the harshness.

Billson

 

[KSIXephos938]

Hmm... I don't have that harsh issue but hopefully time is everything to it. As for now, you can try tuning down the FR at around 6-10KHz. Vocals may be thrown back and details may be slightly lacking more as well buy it may or may not fix the harshness. If that didn't work, the last thing you can do out of EQ-ing will be tuning down the 16KHz. Details will definitely reduced but will hopefully fix the harshness.

Billson

Ok, I've tried burning them in for a while and I think the sound has improved. And by the way, which do you think is better, the IE80 or the M50's? To me the M50's definately has a lot more detail but it doesn't sound as clear, it sounds like static. But the IE80's have a lot more bass and it sounds smoother the the M50's. What's your opinion on these two?

 

[BillsonChang007]

Ok, I've tried burning them in for a while and I think the sound has improved. And by the way, which do you think is better, the IE80 or the M50's? To me the M50's definately has a lot more detail but it doesn't sound as clear, it sounds like static. But the IE80's have a lot more bass and it sounds smoother the the M50's. What's your opinion on these two?

Can't compare them not much experience with IE80

Billson